Patience
by sdbubbles
Summary: He needs time and patience to get over Jeanne, and she needs to understand he doesn't need her to shout at him, or accuse him of bad judgement. He needs her patience.


__**A/N: Oh, it's been so long since I wrote any NCIS stuff, but I heard this song last night and just couldn't help myself. This is sort of an alternative to the bathroom scene in "Family."**

**The song is "Patience" by Take That, and I have to say that Gary Barlow did bloody well to sing at the Olympic Closing Ceremony a week after losing his baby girl. **

**So, hope you enjoy!**

**Sarah x**

* * *

_Just have a little patience__  
__I'm still hurting from a love I lost__  
__I'm feeling your frustration__  
__But any minute all the pain will stop_

In the mens' bathrooms, wiping jam from his shirt, Tony DiNozzo thought on what he needed. He didn't need pushed to see the error of his ways – he knew where he went wrong already. He really did love Jeanne Benoit. Unprofessional, he knew, but he couldn't change what had already happened.

Just then, the door opened, and a woman slipped in wordlessly. He knew Ziva David did not understand why it happened – she hadn't been there – but he also knew she was aware of what heartbreak was. She had, after all, fallen in love with a dying man.

"Whatever you're about to say," he sighed. "Don't."

She gave him a stare, the one that tried to see his heart, and he realised how this must seem to her. She was trained by her father, and he had no doubt, from the way Ziva avoided talking about him, that Eli David was rather cold. She hadn't been taught that the power of the heart could very occasionally cloud even the toughest agent's judgement.

So he knew she would find this difficult, watching him hurt but not truly understanding. It was not really her fault. It was just the way she'd been brought up. But the fact remained that she just could not comprehend why he was in so much pain.

"I did not come here for a row," she told him, her voice strained from trying to keep her frustration at bay. He saw that she was trying her best to keep from being harsh on him. So, for her, he tried to believe that he would stop hurting soon, so she wouldn't need to get worked up over it.

_Just hold me close__  
__Inside your arms tonight__  
__Don't be too hard on my emotions_

He wished more than anything that someone, anyone, would just pull him into a hug and tell him they understood. He wished Ziva would soften up and pull him into her arms and comfort him rather than forcing the sense he already saw onto him.

"Ziva," he began, leaning on a sink unit. "Just don't, OK? You don't need to be harsh. Whatever you're about to tell me, I know."

He felt her dark brown eyes searching him, trying to make some logic out of him. There _was _no logic, though. There was nothing logical about the way he was feeling. She was right: it was a mission, and he knew deep down there was no happy ending to be found. It was an error of judgement to fall in love with Jeanne.

But that didn't mean it didn't hurt to lose her. Logical or not, he _did_ fall in love with her.

_'Cause I need time  
__My heart is numb, has no feeling  
__So while I'm still healing  
__Just try and have a little patience_

"Then what is it that you need, Tony?" she demanded quietly.

What he needed...a drink? Though, getting drunk never really served him well in the past. Hook up with another girl? Not an option when his head was filled with Jeanne's face. A long drive to clear his head? Some chance, considering his car was blown up and Gibbs always had the NCIS vehicle assigned to the team.

"Time," he finally decided. That was it. He needed time, so his broken heart could mend. It was so broken it was cold just now. There was nothing left to break.

He needed her to give him the time to feel better, and to try and get over this awful cold feeling. Surely she knew the importance of time and room to think, mend and breathe. Without those things, he could not get past this. It was going to take a while, and he needed the patience of those around him, but he knew he could move past it.

_I really wanna start over again__  
__I know you wanna be my salvation__  
__The one that I can always depend__  
_

"And what are you going to do in that time?" she raised her eyebrows at him. He knew what she was getting at. He was liable to wallow in self-pity for a good while before he actually decided to try and heal. And he was liable to blame it all on Jenny, but he was well aware that the first step of recovering from this was to admit that, although it was Jenny who placed him in the situation, _he_ was the one to blame for falling in love with a woman who was out of bounds.

"I'm going to start rebuilding the pieces," he replied honestly. He knew he needed to strip away everything and start from scratch, with no women in his life.

Ziva was always the one standing next to him when he needed her support, and he was aware of her wish to be the one he relied on, but he had to start from the beginning, independent of other people.

But he knew he could always trust Ziva David to be at his side when he needed a hand to hold. After all, she was the only one he could count on. Gibbs was...difficult. McGee over-analysed. Abby was too sympathetic. Ducky talked too much. And Jenny was partly to blame for this mess, so that couldn't be a wise idea.

But Ziva was different. She didn't analyse, or talk much, and she definitely didn't indulge him in sympathy. She just listened, and suggested a way forward.

_I'll try to be strong__  
__Believe me, I'm trying to move on__  
__It's complicated but understand me_

He was determined to stay strong. He really did want to look to the future, and he was trying to look forward instead of backwards. But it wasn't easy. It was a struggle to try and move forward when there were so many memories in the past. When there was a woman he loved and lost in the past.

It wasn't as cut and dry and Ziva believed. It wasn't a case of "It was an undercover op, and you need to get over it."

She was trying to understand – he could see it in her eyes – but she was clearly struggling to see the complexity of this. Of course, he knew he shouldn't have been hurt like this, and logic stated that it was clear he could never keep Jeanne, so he ought to have kept his emotions controlled at all times. But that didn't change the fact that he had fallen in love, and was now facing the consequences.

_'Cause I need time__  
__My heart is numb, has no feeling__  
__So while I'm still healing__  
__Just try and have a little patience, yeah__  
_

"Well," she smiled faintly. "If it is time that you need, it is something I can give you." He knew she was able to give him time. It was whether she would bug him about it that worried him. He didn't know if he could put up with her constant efforts to try and talk sense into him.

He couldn't love again until he recovered from this hellish ordeal. His frozen heart would never allow it until he managed to thaw it out. And to do that, it had to be patched up, and he needed time to do that.

To do it properly, though, he needed peace. No nagging. No snapping. No attempts to help him. He needed to be left alone to do it. He would need support, perhaps, but he most definitely did _not_ need to listen to Ziva hark on about errors of judgement.

_Have a little patience, yeah__  
__'Cause these scars run so deep__  
__It's been hard__  
__But I have to believe__  
__Have a little patience__  
__Have a little patience_

He had scarred himself, and others around him. He twisted the knife into Jeanne when he admitted his true intentions when he got involved with her. He had been rather cutting with Jenny, not understanding the scars that ran through her, the ones that caused her drive to catch La Grenioulle.

"It's not easy," he confessed quietly, and he felt her hand on his arm. There was something in her eyes that made him believe she had the patience in her to give him the time and space he needed.

"No," she agreed with him. "But we will be here. If you need us," she added, knowing that there was a good chance they may have just ended up annoying him. He wasn't going to contradict her. He knew his temper was shorter than normal, but he believed it would get easier with time.

_Whoa, 'cause I, I just need time__  
__My heart is numb, has no feeling__  
__So while I'm still healing__  
__Just try, and have a little patience__  
__Have a little patience_

It would never really go away, but it could only get easier from here. There was a softness in Ziva's eyes that told him that she was finally beginning to understand the pain and iciness in his heart, and she was finally understanding that all he needed was space, and time to sort his head out.

It was obvious she didn't fully see why he felt like this, but she saw the bottom line of it, and that was all she really needed to comprehend. And the bottom line was that he had made a mistake in falling in love, and he was trying to repair the damage he inflicted on himself.

The worst feeling was that he couldn't take some of Jeanne's pain away. He was the one who caused it, after all, and he desperately wanted to make her see that he really did love her, but he also knew that would be a bad move. Their relationship was based on a lie, and no-one could have a life worth living when it was rotten at the core.

_My heart is numb, has no feeling__  
__So while I'm still healing__  
__Just try and have a little...__  
__Patience_

He placed a hand gently on her shoulder, searching her face for some kind of emotion, but all he could find was her normal stony resolve while she tried to stand by him. She said nothing more to him, and let him walk away towards the door.

He turned when he opened the door, standing there, watching her. She hadn't turned around, and she wasn't going to. He knew she was trying to keep her thoughts on this to herself. He knew where she stood on this matter. She thought he ought to have had the control to keep himself from falling in love.

But it wasn't so simple. The fact remained, though, that he had done what he shouldn't, and now he had to deal with it.

"Just try and be patient, Ziva," he said, and he walked away, leaving her there to hold her tongue. They both knew now that he did not need anyone to remind him he screwed it up; he needed patience.

* * *

**Hope this is OK!  
Please leave a review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


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